Nokia, the world's largest mobile phone maker, said today it has sold more than 1 billion handsets and estimated that more than 2 billion people use mobile phones worldwide.

"The continued rapid growth in mobile subscriptions has exceeded even the mobile industry's own estimates. Since the early 1990's we have seen voice go truly wireless and mobile phones evolve from voice centric to feature driven devices. Earlier this summer, Nokia sold our one billionth mobile phone - a Nokia 1100 sold in Nigeria," says Kai Oistamo, Senior Vice President, Mobile Phones, Nokia. "It will be new growth markets like Nigeria that will fuel the growth towards three billion subscribers by 2010."

As the industry leader in mobile devices, Nokia has introduced hundreds of innovative mobile phone models since the early 1980's. The company has manufactured mobile phones in high volumes since the beginning of 1990's, when the first digital networks were introduced. In 1998, Nokia announced it had manufactured its 100 millionth mobile phone, and became the world's largest mobile phone manufacturer. In 2004, Nokia was the clear market leader in mobile devices with volumes of 207 million units.

Post a comment and discuss this story with other readers.